Nature has structured us so that self-awareness comes very late on: you only have to study how children are to know that an awareness of self is a very late evolution of character.In general, we can argue that we suffer because a little too much of how we behave happens unconsciously – when we would benefit from a closer grasp on what was going on.Just why is self-knowledge such a prestigious good?What are the dangers that come with a lack of self-knowledge? In other words, not everything that we can know about ourselves is all that important to find out.We believe we seek happiness in love, but it’s not quite that simple.What at times it seems we actually seek is familiarity – which may well complicate any plans we might have for happiness.The very idea that we might not be too difficult as people should set off alarm bells in any prospective partner.

A standard question on any early dinner date should be quite simply: ‘And how are you mad?

And what do we in fact need to know about ourselves? Here we want to focus on the areas of self-knowledge that matter most in life: the areas concerned with the inner psychological core of the self.

When first looking out for a partner, the requirements we come up with are coloured often by a beautiful non-specific sentimental vagueness: we’ll say we really want to find someone who is ‘kind’ or ‘fun to be with’, ‘attractive’ or ‘up for adventure…’It isn’t that such desires are wrong, they are just not remotely precise enough in their understanding of what we in particular are going to require in order to stand a chance of being happy – or, more accurately, not consistently miserable. We’re distinctively neurotic, unbalanced and immature, but don’t know quite the details because no one ever encourages us too hard to find them out.

Prior to marriage, we’re rarely involved in dynamics that properly hold up a mirror to our disturbances.

Whenever more casual relationships threaten to reveal the ‘difficult’ side of our natures, we tend to blame the partner – and call it a day.

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But unfortunately, the lessons we picked up may not have been straightforward.